<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Really Hit the Wall by SandrC</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/22571701">Really Hit the Wall</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/SandrC/pseuds/SandrC'>SandrC</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Not Another Fanfiction Collection [23]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Not Another D&amp;D Podcast (Podcast)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>End of the World, Hardwon is much deeper than people give him credit for, The Boobs as a Family, home is where the heart is, i love my thicc dummy</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-02-05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-02-05</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-04-28 09:53:53</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>General Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>725</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/22571701</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/SandrC/pseuds/SandrC</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>He wasn't expecting a hero's welcome for his homecoming, but he at least expected Irondeep to still be standing.</p><p>He could never show his family where he grew up.</p><p>Fuck, that sucks.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Balnor the Brave &amp; Moonshine Cybin &amp; Hardwon Surefoot &amp; Beverly Toegold V</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Not Another Fanfiction Collection [23]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1312925</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>4</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>37</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Really Hit the Wall</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Similar to Love the Shears, I wanted to explore the "after the world ends" of Hardwon. While Beverly was more introspective and guilt-stricken, Hardwon is more...determined and sad. He knows what needs to be done. He doesn't like it, but he knows.</p><p>I genuinely think that people underestimate Hardwon's emotional intelligence. And his straight intelligence. He's not a wise or cautious person, but he isn't dumb. He's a tactician. He's a fighter. He speaks well at war councils. He is a smart man, he's just dumb. I love him.</p><p>He wants to go home, even though he didn't like living there. Home doesn't exist, so he can't. It's a bittersweet conundrum.</p><p>I may do a Moonshine and Balnor one too. Idk. No promises.</p><p>Title and general mood taken from "Weight of Another" by Blue October. Hello old friend, it's been a while since I've listened to Foiled. That was my depression album when I was younger. Still slaps.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>He hadn't been expecting a hero's welcome. He wasn't a hero, not there anyway, but he had been expecting <em>something</em>.</p><p>Not...<em>this</em>.</p><p>Not a pile of rubble where a mountain once was. Not a storm above the ruins of his home. Not a ship from the fog, carrying the survivors and the hope of Irondeep, greeting those in Gladeholm with pained relief and exhaustion.</p><p>He <em>feels</em>...he feels hollow. Empty. <em>Tired</em>.</p><p>He <em>should</em> feel victorious to some degree.</p><p>He <em>doesn't</em>.</p><p>It's pouring and everyone is cold and miserable, <em>sodden</em>. The wind shrieks around them, making it hard to hear anyone talking. Lightning arcs from cloud to cloud, cutting down in sharp spikes of purple and white light to hammer the ground beneath. The mountain—or what <em>remains</em> of it—shudders and jumps in a way earth <em>should not.</em></p><p>He's <em>alive</em>. Moonshine is <em>alive</em>. Balnor is <em>alive</em>. Bev is <em>alive</em>. Apple and Mavrus and Cobb and Jaina and Lucanus and Erdan and Jolene and <em>so many other people</em> are <em>alive</em>.</p><p>His home is <em>gone</em>.</p><p>But it's <em>not</em>.</p><p>Isn't there some kind of wisdom about "home is where the heart is" and so on? If that's true, then home hasn't been Irondeep for a <em>long</em> fucking time. Home has been Moonshine and Bev and Balnor. It's been whatever bed they were sharing that night, curled close around each other for comfort and warmth, not talking about <em>why</em> they needed it that night. It's been small things like braiding each other's hair and making sure their makeup and so on was good. It's drinking and bawdy songs and rowdy stories to chase away the darkness within and without.</p><p>His home is <em>mostly</em> here. His home is <em>alive</em>. His home <em>still exists.</em></p><p>He <em>still</em> wishes he could have shown them Irondeep. He wonders if it would have closed the open, weeping sore left in his chest when Gemma died. If bringing his home—<em>his family</em>—to his childhood home would have afforded him the closure to string the needle and suture it closed. If showing the people who cared for him the place that didn't would be enough to cauterize it and let it heal.</p><p>It's foolish to think of "<em>if</em>"s and "<em>when</em>"s now. He needs to focus up.</p><p>Irondeep is <em>gone</em> but <em>its people</em> aren't. <em>Jaina</em> is here, along with a chunk of the Kingsguard and the dwarfans, and that <em>means</em> something. They have <em>more</em> than enough space right now in Gladeholm to accommodate them <em>as well</em> as the remaining high elves and crick elves <em>as well</em> as the eladrin and Faewild halflings. If they work fast, they can settle in and start planning. If they work fast, they can find Bev and get him somewhere safe. If they work fast, they'll have a better chance of survival.</p><p>He hadn't been expecting a hero's welcome. He <em>also</em> hadn't been expecting the end of the world.</p><p>Like <em>everything else</em> in his life, he would make due. Pick up the pieces, salvage what's left, and move forward. Don't look back. Don't think about the possibilities that could have been. <em>Just soldier on.</em></p><p>So he squares his shoulders and smiles, wide, bright, fake, <em>walls up</em>. Greets Jaina with a hearty handshake. Pretends like he's not drowning. Like something in him didn't die, buried underneath the rubble of Irondeep.</p><p>He's not getting a hero's welcome, but he <em>is</em> going to make sure there are heroes after all is said and done. He may not have a physical home, but he is going to salvage the world beneath Gladeholm to build a home for the future. He may not have living parents on this plane of existence, but he is going to make sure every child from here on out has <em>someone</em>.</p><p>He'll bloody his knuckles to make the world better. He'll break his bones to set up a better tomorrow.</p><p><em>This</em> world wasn't good to him, but the end of one world is a new beginning for another.</p><p>He just has to close his eyes and pretend that he hasn't lost more than he could ever gain.</p><p>He isn't Hardwon Surefoot of the Irondeep Dwarfanage. He isn't Elias Stormborn Jr. of his parents' sky pirate crew. He's Hardwon Surefoot of the Band of Boobs, and he is going to save the world until he's no longer needed as a hero.</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>